‘Das Wunder der Heliane’ Review: Love, Sex and Death

Bard Summerscape stages a production of the obscure, mystical 1927 work by film composer Erich Wolfgang Korngold.

ByHeidi WalesonJuly 30, 2019 4:06 pm ET

Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y.

Each summer, as part of its one-composer focus, Bard Summerscape exhumes an opera from the repertory graveyard. The Austrian-born Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897-1957), the subject of this year’s examination, is best known in the U.S. for his movie scores, whose symphonic lyricism swept Hollywood (he resettled there in the 1930s, after the Nazis invaded Austria), and for his crowd-pleasing Violin Concerto, given its premiere by Jascha Heifetz in 1947. 

Korngold was a major star in Europe before he scored films like “The Adventures of Robin Hood.” A child prodigy, he attracted attention with a ballet at age 11, and his opera “Die tote Stadt” (1920) was an enormous hit, receiving multiple productions after its premiere in Germany. Bard will present “Die tote Stadt” in concert on Aug. 18, but its fully staged opera production, which opened on Friday, is the truly obscure “Das Wunder der Heliane” (“The Miracle of Heliane,” 1927).

With its weird, mystical story, “Heliane” was out of step with Weimar-era operatic fashion, since audiences were more interested in pieces with contemporary themes. The Bard production, directed by Christian Räth, tried to play down the opera’s heavy-handed, fairy-tale symbolism and religious aura in favor of the emotional journey of the heroine, with some success. However, “Heliane” still seemed less a buried treasure than an intriguing curiosity, worth hearing for its massive, Technicolor orchestration and the way that Korngold’s distinctive idiom recalls not just Strauss and Wagner, but also the clangorous fortissimos of Bartók and the rhapsodic lines of Puccini. 

Hans Müller-Einigen’s libretto is based on a play by Hans Kaltneker. Heliane, the only character with a name, is married to the despotic Ruler of an unhappy country. The Ruler has arrested and condemned to death the charismatic Stranger, who has tried to bring joy to the country’s downtrodden people. Heliane secretly visits the Stranger in prison, and to comfort him on the eve of his execution, she shows him her naked body. Her jealous husband, who has never himself gotten past what he calls her “icy innocence,” has her put on trial for adultery (the penalty is death). When the Stranger kills himself to protect her, she is ordered to prove her purity by raising him from the dead, which, indirectly, she does. The overarching theme is the power of love—the act of accepting her own erotic nature allows Heliane to finish the Stranger’s work and free the people. Unsurprisingly, she has to die for this to happen.

Led by Leon Botstein, the 80-member orchestra—complete with triple and quadruple winds, extra brass, two harps and multiple keyboards, including organ, harmonium and celesta—excelled in big statements. Other than the voluptuous eroticism of the encounter between the Stranger and Heliane, Act I was mostly muscular and noisy. However, the court scene of Act II had the dramatic urgency of Puccini. By Act III, the mystical trial, we were well into the realm of Wagnerian apotheosis, with ecstatic melodies enveloped in opulent harmonies. 

The massed forces require powerful singers, and soprano Aušrine Stundyte was consistently impressive as Heliane, able to soar over the orchestra yet still maintain an affecting vulnerability, especially in the purity trial, when she sounded like a woman who wanted her lover back. Bass-baritone Alfred Walker clearly conveyed the vicious cruelty of the Ruler with his clipped, aggressive delivery. The Stranger is a challenging Heldentenor part, and Daniel Brenna acquitted himself with clarion distinction in the first two acts, but sounded weary after his resurrection in the third. As the Messenger, who is also the Ruler’s ex-lover, mezzo Jennifer Feinstein infused her performance with bile; tenor Joseph Demarest had a sweetly lyrical cameo moment as the Young Man, who speaks in defense of Heliane. The capable chorus captured the fickle nature of the crowd. 

Designer Esther Bialas created an ingenious, if gloomy-looking, Rubik’s cube of a set—several translucent panels, with stairs behind them, that were rearranged throughout to create the various locations. The best was the courtroom, where the six bald judges, in red robes with flowing sleeves and giant ruffs, arrayed themselves forbiddingly on steep bleachers. Ms. Bialis also came up with a good solution for Heliane’s nakedness: a gauzy, semi-transparent garment that revealed just enough to make the point. However, neither the Stranger’s unflattering orange prison jumpsuit nor his resurrection outfit, which looked like plastic wrap, helped reinforce the character’s seductive appeal. Thomas C. Hase’s lighting also took the story’s dark environment a bit too literally: In Act I, it was sometimes difficult to see what was going on.

Mr. Räth’s directing emphasized the story’s human aspects—the Ruler’s festering anger at his wife, Heliane’s gradual awakening as she discovers that she actually loves the Stranger, and how the power of the state is arrayed against her. Catherine Galasso’s movement direction added texture, contrasting the rigid exercises of the guards with a flowing dream sequence during the radiant Act III prelude: A bevy of women, costumed, like Heliane, in the nakedness garment, danced with her, demonstrating the awakening of her true feelings. (They then put her into a straitjacket for the purity trial to come.) The transcendent music at the end of the opera suggests some kind of supernatural union of the two deceased lovers, but Mr. Räth left the dead Heliane alone on the stage at curtain, her “miracle” having cost her everything. So much for fairy tales. 

—Ms. Waleson writes on opera for the Journal and is the author of “Mad Scenes and Exit Arias: The Death of the New York City Opera and the Future of Opera in America” (Metropolitan).